I worked at a retail store for about six months and after the six months I got a nine cent raise and I realize that maybe this isn't for me, maybe I should try to start my own business. - Trevor Oldham

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About Trevor:
At a young age Trevor always knew that he was going to be an entrepreneur. As the years passed by, Trevor and his love of entrepreneurship grew exponentially. At age seventeen, he imported phone cases and sold them to all of his friends and family. Today Trevor is a podcaster, author and creator of Become The Lion, a place where he and his business partner inspire and help young entrepreneurs under 19 years old to start and grow their online business.

Trevor talks about:

Growing up in Cape Cod, Massachusetts, USA

Starting his entrepreneurship by selling lemonade door to door in the neighbourhood

Starting a clothing company as a young boy trying to sell on Ebay

Getting inspired by his dad who is a history teacher

Studying at university

The importance of reading books to improve the business sense and get inspired

Being only 20 years old running a company and how to deal with negative comments

Why he started Become The Lion podcast

How it is helping people under 19 years old with their entrepreneurship and why he feels it is important

The podcast Become The Lion and the joy of interviewing successful entrepreneurs

Yenny: [00:00:00] All right. So let's get started. Hello and welcome Trevor how are you today?

Trevor: [00:00:07] I'm doing excellent today. Thank you for having me on the show.

Yenny: [00:00:10] Oh thank you so much for all. First of all to get in touch with me I was very I feel very honoured because you are such an amazing and inspiring person. Can you just say hello to my audience say who you are. Your name where are you based on what you do now?

Trevor: [00:00:28] Yeah for sure. So my name is Trevor Oldham. I'm a 20 year old entrepreneur. I'm from Cape Cod Massachusetts and I have this company called Become The Lion and Become The Lion is it's along the lines of motivational company inspirational company. We have a 500000 following on social media. You know we write we have a blog where we just try to motivate people to try to help them start a business and get a better life. And then we also have a podcast as well where we interview highly successful entrepreneurs like suddenly yes we've had John Lee Dumas and Joel Braun that just really much a little bit about me. And then I've also write for a few different blogs or you know a digital success and of the daily positive. But now I've kind of just really started writing for Become The Lion so that's a little bit about me.

Trevor: [00:01:21] That's that's a lot like in five years probably done like a hundred more things.

Yenny: [00:01:31] But first of all can you just share with the listeners if you have any one of your first vivid childhood memories.

Trevor: [00:01:40] I think one of my first one of the memories I can really go back to is it was a it was like a summer day and I was out of I was out of school and I had a friend that lived here and about two houses down and we decided that we wanted to sell lemonade one day. But the thing is where we lived in our part of town it was way out in the woods and basically the middle of nowhere on the outskirts of town. And we were trying to sell lemonade on the street and yet but no one was coming. So I think we're like seven eight years old so we had our offers have affairs me but we had the grand idea of hey let's go door to door selling lemonade in our neighbourhood. The only problem was that we didn't tell our parents. So when they when they came home and they find me my friend not there. And obviously this is a time like we didn't have cell phones or anything so they can couldn't us. So that's and so I was like my first stop and entrepreneurship are over that they want to call it what they found us they found a little bit later and I'll just say they weren't too happy.

Yenny: [00:02:47] Do you remember how much money you made.

Trevor: [00:02:50] I think we split like $4 and 25 cents between the two of us.

Trevor: [00:02:57] So all you could focus on was just to sell lemonade.

Trevor: [00:03:02] And we sold it for 25 cents you know.

Yenny: [00:03:09] Have you always been this entrepreneurial kind of person?

Yenny: [00:03:17] Can you just tell the listeners a little bit about you and where does it come from. Is it from your mom or dad or have you just got it naturally in you?

Trevor: [00:03:29] I think it's a little bit of both.

Trevor: [00:03:36] I feel like I've always been an entrepreneur but I never knew that it was called entrepreneurship. Growing up I noticed how you mentioned how it tried to sell lemonade and then are always trying to buy and sell baseball cards are always put up flyers to mow people's lawns. And I even had a designer clothing company called Ed Hardy clothing and I used to try to buy at my local retail store and and sell it on Ebay for a higher profit and I always just didn't really like working for someone else. And that was just something that I noticed in me and I actually worked at a job at a retail store for about six months and after the six months I got a nine cent raise and I realize I realized that I maybe maybe this isn't for me maybe I should try to start my own business. This is my senior year of high school and I just really I started importing products from China. Long story short they were knock offs which I didn't know at the time that I was. I had to eat the profit then from there I ended up importing other bracelets and watches from China. But this time I learned not to buy them name brand so I built a brand culture for Travor James Products off that.

[00:04:49] It was called Trevor James products so it was like nautical theme bracelets and watches and so that was really how I got really started into entrepreneurship. And then during my school I was at school last year. I was away from my friends I was away from my family and the school I go to right now it's but it's about 4500 students. But it's a it's a commuter school. So on the weekends it's about 2500 but then half of those people go home. So it's like a really there's not a lot of people there on the weekends and then when you try to meet people at the club like clubs at your school you can't do it wasn't like a lot of people. So pretty much on the weekend all my friends would go home and I just would sit there not knowing what to do. And that was really when I got started into reading books. I think I read you know 30 or 40 books my first course my first year my freshman year and I was where I maybe read three or four the entire summer and I was when I didn't even read a book in high school. So really just reading books of my eye but I noticed my dad. He's always helped me out with it. He had his own business for a little while. And I think he's just really been the inspiration for me to do that. And he's always telling me like different guests on our podcast. He's always sending me different articles like he has like a book.

[00:06:03] He's got the Think And Grow Rich book from a conference he attended in like 2000. He has the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey and he met him so he has that autograph. Right now he's a history teacher. I think that's something he's always interested in. So I think he's really just pushed me along to really realize that you know it's not crazy being entrepreneur and I think that's just been really helpful for me.

[00:06:27] And what was the first book that you started to read that you really got you going.

[00:06:34] I think the first book I really read that really got me going I'd have to say it would be Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson. And I don't know just something about that book in the way Steve Jobs, his life was depicted and how he ran Apple and I just I watch Steve Jobs has a great speech from when he did the Stanford commencement. And like sitting right in front of me right now I have a Steve Jobs quote where it says where it goes along the lines of it's like: "Here are the crazy ones the misfits the rebels the troublemakers..." and I just have that I have that merely posters in front of me when I work. And then when I'm at school I have the same mural but just laminated poster and put right over my bed when I sleep. I think Steve Jobs is just such an inspiration for me just the way he worked and just how passionate he was running the company and I could I could see you know how much work went into designing the inside and the inside of an Apple computer and how much went into designing the box of an iPhone. And he really realized for me that you know how much work you should be putting in the things that people don't see because you're going to you're going to know what they're going to look like and you know how they're going to see. So it's just an eye opening book for me. And then I think another you know entrepreneurship book that really changed my mind was I recently read it within the last you know two or three months and it was "The Millionaire Fastlane" by Amgen DeMarco. And he was just he was gives different tips on being a what it means to be or what it means to be an entrepreneur. What it means to be a millionaire and one of the concepts that I thought was different when I read that book was growing up you know I read like the Dave Ramsey book I. They all tell you to invest in the stock market. But the thing that he mentioned in the book was how the wealthy use the stock market to protect their wealth and not to build their wealth. And that was just something that was like a new concept that I really learned which is something I really liked.

Yenny: [00:08:28] And has anyone told you you have an old soul because you're quite young and you know no one mentioned that because you must have a lot of comments about that all the time.

Trevor: [00:08:45] Actually I haven't heard that one yet.

[00:08:46] Oh OK. But I just thought you know I talk to a very old soul and a young young man you know and I really respect that and I'm just amazed. I wish I wish I could be that person myself I just I just started to figure out things when I turned 40 and you know that's when my eyes started to open more and more and when I started to read books I really admire that. But before we started the conversation or the interview you actually mention about that the age people have been commenting about that in a negative way.

Trevor: [00:09:28] So I slowly go on Facebook or on to see the comments sometimes on our website. I notice a lot of people attacking my age which I don't. It's just something that's new to me. I guess it is such a big company that you're going to have people who dislike you. But I have a lot of and they are these kids 20 years old who doesn't know what he's talking about. And then I think it's really I don't really stop myself and say wait a second you're on you're on my company you're on my page you know. And I think that's something that someone looking out there to start a business that people are going to attack you you know no matter what you do. I noticed recently we had a really negative comment on our podcast saying you know someone is saying how they think that I'm really well off and that like all that just really negative towards everything about the podcast. And I was like the first negative review every offer and then we have to stop and say for a second what is going on within within this person's mind like you know for me I come my dad like I said earlier my dad's a history teacher. My mom's a retail store manager. You know we live in a town of 6000 people. I don't really have any connections starting off so I don't know. Sometimes people get the solution all when they see someone who has acquired some success and think that it was just handed to them. But I don't know that's just something that I kind of just like the style because it used to upset me. Why is people attacking me? I think when you look down towards really people just attacking themselves to a point because they just feel so insecure about someone else gaining success that they just don't know how to handle it.

Yenny: [00:11:05] So how do you deal with it you just move on and let them attack themselves?.

Trevor: [00:11:12] You just said. It's nice because we have such a big following. That usually if I see it I just like move on like you know whatever. And like they used to didn't see the point. But now the company has actually gone pretty as big as it is so it's nice we have fans here like our diehard fans and then they'll kind of just like attack people. So it's just like so like nice guys like when we were first starting out we were smaller. When you get like you know someone disagreeing or hating on the company that would be the only one. But now we have people who really back up the company so it's just been nice to see.

Yenny: [00:11:47] What is your company?.. because you do a couple different thing. What do you do I think it's just amazing you've really inspired people travel and Trevor and that is yeah. Really. Yeah. I've seen so I've actually read through a lot of comments and I actually people come back and keep commenting on your post on your Facebook Page and so you have how many followers do you have you have like on Instagram you have and all of a hundred and ten k's or something like this. And a couple of hundred thousand on Facebook as well. So yeah sorry just got excited. So what. What is your company what do you do?

Trevor: [00:12:35] So for a company I am and you mentioned we have a big social media following now. That was just the premise of what we were doing when we were starting off of the company. But so now we're really focused now we are the social media following. So now we're really focusing on building up our blog. So on our blog we try to motivate people and we try to help them to build an online business and our companies become aligned so it's more of a geared toward men but I've noticed like if I do make a post using a woman on her Instagram or Facebook we do have a good following there as well. So what we do I mean we have a podcast so we try to just help people take from where they are to become successful so my business partner he has created two different businesses which have allowed him to make six figures six figures and I've had my own companies as well. So when we came together. We wanted to share people what it really takes to become successful especially because I'm 20 and my business partner he's 21 and we've noticed especially in the millennial generation, this is people who expect that they deserve handouts or expect all these different things we want to show them that just because you're young doesn't mean that you can't acquire success. Just because you're young doesn't mean you don't have to work for it. So what we've been doing recently is we're going to be releasing a teen mentoring program where we're going to help people under the age of 19 really guide them. You know we're going to do group calls of them we're going to give them accountability. We're going to show them how to go next. We just want to help provide a strong foundation for people who are like us when we're younger that don't really have too much guidance when it came to you know goal setting when it came to accountability when it came to finding a mastermind. And so we're doing that. But then in the last couple months we're really going to be releasing. We are going to be focusing more on like how to build an all around brand because we noticed like there's a lot of online courses where I'll teach you how to build a Facebook following URL teach you how to build Instagram falling. We're going to try. We're going to create a course where we're going to show you how to build a Twitter Facebook and Instagram and then also how to build up an email list and then how to build up a podcast following as well. So that's just something we're working on right now which we're really excited about.

Yenny: [00:14:48] And you have to be under 19 years old. I'm just seeing you going to schools. Oh I wish it was something like this one hour stand a chance because. Yeah. Is that also something that you're doing because you feel like you didn't have that at school.

Trevor: [00:15:10] Yeah. I mean I'm I'm in school right now. But when we were younger yeah I was like a lot of things. So I'm I'm transferring schools which I'm excited about some transferring the new school I'm going to majoring in e-commerce and digital business which I think is really pretty much what I love to do. But the school I'm in right now I noticed they don't really help help you out too much if you're an entrepreneur. Like I'm always I know Robert Kiyosaki always says you know school "Schools always train people to become employees and their own schools don't really train people to become entrepreneurs to employ the employees". And I just think we really want to show people that you know it really doesn't matter age. You can't start a successful business.

Yenny: [00:15:55] That's awesome. Yes. So what do you do with the podcast. Who'd you interview and why did you start that?

Trevor: [00:16:02] So I started I do a podcast because had been listening to a few podcasts myself and I just thought you know it's pretty cool to see what happened so I decided as I did the park that interview successful people. So recently over the past you know two or three months I really honed in on what it's about. That's why I like to do is I could take entrepreneurs or even successful individuals. So I start off asking them you know how did they get started as an entrepreneur. And then from there I want I really like to talk about them about their fears and challenges that they have in life. I try to humanise them for our audience that even though it's just really successful person they are human like everyone else. And then once we do go through that session then I like to talk about what made them successful how they overcome the dark days because I really want to show people that you know even though this person is highly successful that they're just like me knew that they had these challenges. We all have these fears to overcome and some of the people that we've interviewed you know I've interviewed Joel Brown from he's from a Addicted To Success. I've interviewed John Lee Dumas from Entrepreneur On Fire, Chris Tucker who wrote the book Virtual Freedom. Alex Mooren and he's was a millionaire by 25. And so I've been able to interview just so many different guests from you know all these different areas. I've interviewed a Hollywood actress which was pretty cool. She just she was really good. I think we ever had over you know 30 or 30 podcast released and we released two a week with different entrepreneurs or successful individuals. But the biggest thing for me I've noticed from starting a podcast is just being able to make the connections that I've been able to make. And I just never realised you know I never started the podcast to try to make connections with all these different people but that's just the way it's turned out and it's just been just a lot of fun to talk to other entrepreneurs. So I know for me being an entrepreneur there's not a lot of like minded people out there. And part in podcasting is the one way in which I'm able to connect with them.

Yenny: [00:18:01] Yeah it becomes quite intimate. And also like for people when they listened they kind of get to know a person. Yeah I really agree with that. With your interviews. What is your biggest fear.

Trevor: [00:18:16] I think my biggest fear. I mean the biggest thing is just always if it doesn't work out I don't know. That's just something that's always been mine. That's just something that motivates me every day you know so I'm just honest. I'm a big firm believer that everything you have can be taken away from you if you don't continue to work for it. And I see I'm a big sports fan so I can see like in the NFL are the NLB people who have these large contracts and they don't they don't manage the money well. And the I think it's like 80 percent of them go broke within three years after coming out of the league. So I just really realised you know try not to put my foot down on the break. I just want to keep moving as fast as I can and keep crying that momentum said it's never when I have to worry about money. I never want to have to worry about you know which colleges I have to send my kids to. So I did just the big for me is just what happens if it doesn't work out. But I know that is going to work out so it just motivates me as much as I can to keep pushing forward every single day.

Yenny: [00:19:16] Is there any how is this thing like some people when the hear or entrepreneur or you want to be successful and oh yea and all those people that just want to make money. What is your motivation to do it.
[00:19:32] And I think if this thing I know it's money but what else is it. Is it to push the boundaries. Is that what it is.

Trevor: [00:19:42] I think for me it's just you know try for the first thing is you know making money is nice but it's also just trying to help people realize you know like I said earlier a little bit earlier. Right. You go to school you're just told to get a job no one. Really for me I before I even write in my books I always thought I was going to go to school and get a job. I think so many people have that knowledge and they just don't realize that. All right wait a second. I can do something different and I've seen it in my friends and family who are working a job that they don't necessarily like but they just don't know that there's another way. There is there has been so thought that they have to go to school they have to get a job and where they came in you know leave that job because they're so scared of what happens, and they just become trapped. So for me the biggest motivation is to show other people the way that even they can start it. I've started a business you know my bought phone cases or I bought the jewelry you can start a business for under $100. It doesn't have to be as extravagant thing when you're trying to start off. So that's been a huge motivation to me. And then another motivation for me is just to prove to myself what I you know where I thought I couldn't do that I can do. I'm always just trying to grow my wish is trying to evolve and I just feel like growing up you have these preconditioned notions on subconscious mind that don't allow us you know to really live the fullest we can be, like for example for one to two years and fitnesses I never said I never said I always said to myself I can never run long distance. And I decided to go off the tracks. And I and I kept saying to myself I can't run long distance and I ended up just doing sprinting which I end up becoming really good at and then it came to be I ended up running a race called The Spartan Race last year and I was training for it and it was ended up being 10 miles. I noticed that was the first time I was able to run 10 miles straight. And I realized wait a second I was telling myself this entire time that I couldn't run long distance and you know here I am I ran these 10 miles. And for me as just saying if there's something else that comes up in the business you know let's say we made a few thousand dollars a month. I'll say to myself oh I can never make $10000 in one month. And then I just push myself. I feel like I always just put these like not so much limitations but I was you, put these high goals and myself I'd say oh I'm never going to achieve them. And then just motivates myself to go out and then achieve them.

Yenny: [00:22:04] Now that's great. But also lets talk about things that you like to do your hobbies and stuff like that. And I know that you do photography like that.

Trevor: [00:22:17] Yeah no I really I really like photography. It's just something that me and my sister has been a big help. When she first went to college she was majoring in photography and she end up switching over to graphic design. So but photography has always been something that she really liked and that was just something that I really got into the last couple of years. So we live on on Cape Cod. So like we're right on the ocean. So you're going to take like you know really nice photos there every night with the sunset. And even during the winter when the snow is on the ground but the you know the sunsets like a pink sunset it just looks really nice. I just noticed, And I do photography and I go and take photos. I just try to unplug I just leave everything behind. I don't bring my phone with me you know. And it's just I have really just be with nature. I know as an entrepreneur I spend a lot of time just in my room working on my computer. So it really just gives me an opportunity to go outside and then just you know breathe in fresh air just the elements to be with nature and it's just not as if I do that for a few hours and then I can come back I can work and go and just work really strong even while I'm out there taking photos. That's one sometimes I have the best ideas for my company. I mean I have a different idea. You know I'll remember I guess I wanted to go on our podcast or remember a good idea for a blog post. And I just noticed or I'm just out there. What I'm not focusing on my work is what I tend to have the best ideas for my work.

Yenny: [00:23:43] I was just going to ask you about a question I always thought like if you have any self-care hacks that to do every day that you could share with the listeners so that's one of them. Do you have anything else here you do just to clean your mind?

Trevor: [00:23:58] Yeah. So one of the big things is I really love to meditate. I try to meditate. I think I checked this morning so I meditated. I was doing it 50 days in a row. So my goal is to hit a year in a row and I just noticed from meditating just on every single day. Is this I just have a clear mind like nothing really upsets me anymore. I just do. I just do a simple breathing do two simple breathing techniques one might be where you breathe in for four seconds and then you breathe out for eight seconds and then another one is breathing for four you hold for four seconds. You breathe out for 4 seconds and then you hold for four seconds. So just doing those little breathing techniques every single morning so I do it for 10 minutes in the morning and then I usually do it between two to five minutes depending on how rushed I am when I go to bed at night. And I just love doing this meditation every single day. And then go over a long winded meditation as I also do I try to do yoga every single day I try to do between anywhere between you know something just for 10 to 15 minutes of yoga every single day and it's not as like the combination of those two exercise every day. It just allows me to just be clear minded. I don't like things that used to upset me. I just like brush over them and just don't ask myself I just have a much calmer and cooler demeanor than I had right before I even started the meditation.

Yenny: [00:25:14] Are you sure you're just twenty?... And when you're in that state of mind when you just leave everything that's when everything comes to you. It's just amazing feeling isn't it.

Yenny: [00:25:36] Did you have any other books that you could recommend?
[00:26:03] It's called The Daily Lion. You can find it on Amazon and that was written by me and my co-founder. So we went back through our Instagram account and we took our top 400 quotes. So we have the quotes in the book. We also took the paragraphs that we wrote. So when I read posts on Instagram we always make sure we write a paragraph underneath explaining the quote that so desires us to differentiate ourselves from a lot of the other accounts on Instagram. So we went back and we just took those we took the 400 quotes and the paragraph underneath. So then we put them in a book with them or we did. Some of the quotes might be from July. And here we are working on it in January. So obviously our minds that's going to be different. So we went back and we just edited all the quotes from you know part of the mindset that we have right now. So we recently released that. That was just something I never I never imagined myself doing. But so for the other two books I am a big fan of this book is called Outwitting The Devil by Napoleon Hill and a lot of people I've read thinking grow rich which is you know a of entrepreneurship book you should read. But for outwitting the devil I are of as many people know about it.
[00:27:21] So essentially in the book Napoleon Hill he realizes that universe he wrote Thinking And Grow Rich. But he realizes that wait a second. I never tried any of these principles myself. I just wrote about these successful people and what he does is he literally starts his life over in a new state. Literally ground zero and he takes himself through the entire journey of how he implemented Think And Grow Rich into his own life. So it is just really cool to see how he was able to do it. And then another book that I'm a big fan of has any book by Grant Cardone The two of my favorite books by him would have to be The Ten Times Rule.
[00:28:13] And then Be Obsessed Or Be Average, which is another book from him now is his newest book and I highly I wasn't so that I think three or four times on audio book and read it one or two times the physical book. So that's been one of my favorite books as well.

Yenny: [00:28:28] And yeah I was just wondering if you people find you Trevor?
[00:28:37] So for you can go to www.becomethelion.com
[00:28:40] There'll be social media handles on Facebook Twitter and Instagram and obviously on iTunes as well as a podcast as Become The Lion and then for me you can find me on Facebook under Trevor Oldham Instagram.

Yenny: [00:29:02] If you could see yourself in 10 years time and talk to that future self what would you say to him?

Trevor: [00:29:14] I think I would say that future Trevor in 10 years would be, continue to take big risks and to realize that you know where I'm at right now you know where I'm at right now has no place for him going to be and where and when to be down in the future. So yes it's fine to celebrate the winds right now but also to realize that you know the person I am going to be six months from now is going to be entirely different than the person I am today.